The shadow feeling left behind, the memory and the stain

“Well? What do you think?” Kim showed Gina over to the full-length mirror so she could take a look at herself and see what she looked like.

Gina was stunned.

“Is… is that… really me?” She asked, eyes wide. It didn’t seem possible that she could actually look so…

Well, cute.

When Gina first was brought to the island she fought tooth and nail against clothes like this, which had been **** upon her by Sylvia. Of course, it had never just been about the clothes. She’d also lost all her tattoos, she’d had her hair straightened and turned blonde, and in general it had just been a fairly unpleasant experience for her all around because she was still stuck in a very self-destructive mindset at the time.

As this morning had proved to her (whether she was willing to admit it or not) she hadn’t fully moved past that self-destructive mindset; her uneasiness and doubt about how well she would do on a serious, sincere date with Nick had given her cold feet, and she’d gone to do something really stupid by trying to hold Carly’s feet to the fire and **** her into a threesome that neither of them actually wanted to go through with.

…To be clear, Gina would totally be fine with a threesome at some other point, say, next round, but she agreed with Carly in the end that now was really not the best time.

So… here she was. Having accepted that it could be worthwhile to at least give sincerity a try, she’d come to Kim filled with embarrassment and doubt. She’d considered escaping at least three times while Kim had stepped away to pick out dresses for her, but had stopped herself each time.

She had to face this. Even if she was scared.

When Gina closed her eyes, a lifetime of bad decisions and mistakes poured through her mind. She saw all the people who had tried to sincerely connect with her and understand her, the people who had tried to make a genuine effort for her- most importantly, her parents.

Gina had pushed them all away, when she could, or had just run away from them, when she couldn’t. And then she’d get drunk again to make her pain go away, and start falling into another hole, and the entire cycle would repeat again.

That was her life. That had always been who she was. So it wasn’t a surprise that her first instinct when Nick tried to do the same thing and genuinely connect with her as a person (instead of just using her for sex) was to run away again and try to change his mind.

But I can’t keep living that. Fuck, Morgana can be brave and try to have a genuine relationship with Nick, and she’s like ten years younger than I am! (Gina wasn’t the best at math.)

If she can do it… can’t I?

Gina closed her eyes again. Those swirled around her, just as condemning as always. But when she opened her eyes, and saw the woman staring back at her…

“…I… I guess… it’s okay?” Gina mumbled, tugging at her tangled hair, full of knots. “You don’t think it looks weird?”

“The dress?” Kim shook her head. “No, the dress looks lovely.”

Gina winced. “Yeah, but… I’m in it. And it… really doesn’t fit me. I mean… yeah, fine, fuck, whatever, I look cute, sure… but… come on. Me? Cute?”

Gina didn’t do “cute”. The outfits she felt most comfortable in were ones that made a statement. Bold leather, studded collars, torn jeans, things that screamed “Look at me!” while at the same time warning “But you better hang back…”

She liked looking dangerous. She liked looking cool and alluring. Even when dressing up for a classy party like at one of her previous parties, she’d chosen a dress that would make sure all eyes would be on her, and everyone would be wondering “Damn, she looks amazing in that!”

But cute?

“Gina, I think cute works just fine for you!” Kim insisted, placing her hands on her hips and looking firmly at her customer. She knew the punk girl probably wouldn’t believe her, but she wasn’t about to be dissuaded. “I do think we can do more to make it a good fit for you, though. It could be that this just isn’t the right dress, yeah?”

“Uh… maybe?” Gina wasn’t sure. This was the third dress she’d tried on so far, and it looked much better than the other two. Kim had tried her best to find ones in her favorite colors, but there was only so much you could do with black and harsh gray before you started treading into “Gothic Lolita” territory, and Morgana kind of had that market cornered.

So the only dresses they had left were white ones like this, or ones in pastels.

Or… god forbid…

…Pink.

“I think this one would look great on you,” Kim said, holding up another dress. “I know what you said before, but I really think you should try-”

“NOT pink,” Gina interrupted her immediately, looking sharply at her roommate. “You’re the clerk, right? You’re supposed to follow the customer’s wishes?”

Kim bit her lip. That’s what she was trying to do.

There was an old adage that everybody adhered to, which claimed “The customer is always right.” People parroted that quote in the sales industry (or at least, ignorant customers did) assuming that meant that you should always adhere to the customer’s wishes when it came to serving their needs.

For the most part this was correct.

But the phrase itself was a butchered quote.

The actual quote, Kim knew from her classes, was “Assume the customer is right until it is plain beyond all question that he is not” and frankly, Kim believed that one to be a more adequate description of her job.

Sometimes, the customer WASN’T right. Sometimes, you DID need to tell them when a pair of jeans made them look fat.

Right now, Kim was stuck at a crossroads that any sales rep was likely to find themselves in at some point in their career. The time when the customer was asking for something, but the conditions they include made fulfilling their wishes all but impossible.

Simply put, Gina wanted to look cute. That was the request she was making as a customer. “Find me a dress that will make me look cute for my date with Nick.”

The only problem was, she’d attached the condition of “No pink!” to that request, and all the cutest dresses that Kim thought would look the best on her had at least a little bit of pink in them.

So Kim was stuck. The only way to do what Gina asked was to give her a dress that Gina refused to wear. So what the hell was she supposed to do!? She was very good at bullshitting in order to make a sale, but she doubted her usual tricks would work on the punk girl. No, Gina knew what she wanted and what she didn’t want, and she wasn’t some easily-flattered housewife trying to bring the spark back into her marriage who would be satisfied with some light praise.

Gina didn’t think “cute” was something she could pull off, meaning the difficulty level of satisfying her was sky-high from the outset.

This was the kind of customer that made Kim want to bash her skull in back when she worked retail full (or, well, part) time.

“…Gina, I’m going to be honest with you here,” Kim said, walking around the stack of dresses she’d picked out and looking her roommate right in the eyes. “You’re being too stubborn about this, and if you keep making things difficult you’re going to be late for your date. And you don’t want that, right?”

Gina glanced at the clock winced. “No, I… I don’t,” she conceded.

Kim’s smile returned and she clapped her hands together. “Great! Then put on a pink dress.”

“No! I already said-!”

“What’s your problem with pink?!” Kim demanded. She didn’t even like pink herself but this was getting ridiculous. “You sound like a third-grade boy whining about cooties! It’s a perfectly fine color and you might even look good in it! But you won’t even give it a try?!”

She knew that Gina’s first transformation had been pretty awful for her, but this was kind of pushing it she felt.

Gina gave her a hard look. The kind of look that told Kim she wanted to be screaming right now, but was holding herself back.

Kim could work with that.

“What about your apron?” She asked, getting Gina’s attention. “That’s pink, isn’t it?”

Gina had snagged an apron from the cooking challenge several rounds earlier and Kim had noticed her bringing it out on occasion, whenever she tried cooking. Which was more and more often. She’d seen it hanging at the front of their closet several times, actually cleaned, unlike most of the punk girl’s other clothes.

When confronted with proof that an article of pink clothing existed in Gina’s possession without being set on fire, the punk girl fell silent, giving Kim a stony look and unable to come up with anything else to say.

“…That’s different, it’s… an apron,” she finally muttered, giving Kim an answer that sounded lamer than she could imagine.

Kim’s head actually hurt. She sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration. “…Seriously?” She muttered. “I mean… seriously?”

“What do you want from me?!” Gina protested, looking at her in frustration. “I’m not… I hate clothes like that, okay?! But the apron is different!”

Okay, time for Kim to play hardball. If Gina wasn’t going to be reasonable, Kim could get her a different way.

“Gina… a good girl would try on the dress,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “Otherwise, she might be late for her date with Nick. And a good girl wouldn’t want to be late, right?”

Gina’s face twisted into a furious expression, as Kim anticipated. The punk girl knew exactly what Kim was trying to do here, and she couldn’t stand it!

“That’s not going to work on me,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest.

Kim blinked and gave her an innocent expression. “What isn’t going to work?” She asked.

Gina narrowed her eyes. “You know what.”

Kim was trying to exploit her transformation. Ironically, it was the transformation she’d gotten in exchange for being allowed to choose her own wardrobe again.

• Leave the Clothes, Take the Cannoli: Gina doesn’t want to wear pretty dresses or wash out her hair dye? Fine, she can dress however she likes. But that won’t help the overwhelming urge she’ll have from this point on to become more responsible and behave like a “Good Girl”, especially as far as others are concerned! (Good Girl)

Kim shrugged. “Look, Gina, you don’t HAVE to wear the dress. I’m just saying…”

“Yeah, you’re trying to guilt me into doing it,” she growled, already stripping off the cute dress she was wearing. She’d liked it before, but after that stunt of Kim’s, now even this wasn’t good for her. “That’s really low, Kim!”

“Gina!” Kim immediately felt bad. She knew what it was like to have a transformation used against you. “I’m sorry! I didn’t… that was really low of me, you’re right. I just… I’m trying to help you here!”

The punk girl was down to her bra and panties now. Kim had to look away to keep from seeing the tattoos on her arm. So she raised her head and **** her eyes to meet Gina’s, seeing the hurt and agitation in there.

“I’m sorry for trying to pressure you,” she apologized. “That was unbelievably not cool. I know how much you don’t like being pressured into doing stuff.”

The amount of sincere emotion pouring off the tomboy actually dulled Gina’s rage slightly. She scratched her cheek and looked away. “Yeah, look… it’s not… whatever. …Just… don’t do that, okay? Don’t try to control what I wear.”

Kim winced. Yeah… doing what she’d tried to do… that was wrong. She’d gotten frustrated and impatient and almost made a big mistake. That’s no better than when Sylvia **** her into those clothes in the first place.

Seeing the guilt on Kim’s face, Gina softened a little. She could see that Kim genuinely felt bad, and any remaining anger towards her roommate disappeared with that.

“…I guess I can tell you…” she mumbled.

Kim perked up, surprised. “Eh?”

Gina bit her lip and managed to look Kim in the eye again. She grabbed the crumpled-up dress and pulled it back on, covering her arm. “When I was a kid… I really used to like bright clothes. Pink was actually my favorite color, if you can believe it.”

The look of disgust on Gina’s face as she said that was just one of the many reasons Kim couldn’t believe it.

“…You used to like pink.” Kim didn’t even phrase it as a question, rather a blunt statement of incredulity, an impeachment of Gina’s honesty.

“Lots of girls that age like pink!” Gina snapped, her face getting hot. “What, did you think I popped outta the womb in a leather jacket or something!?”

Kim didn’t actually think about Gina’s childhood at all, if she was being honest. It wasn’t like she and her roommate were that close.

“…Well, I liked it,” she muttered, her face heating up. “My mom always used to buy me these pink froofy dresses, and I wore ‘em because I liked ‘em, but I also wanted to wear other stuff, too…” Gina’s eyes drifted over to one of the outfits Kim picked out, which looked remarkably similar to those “froofy dresses” from her childhood.

“…As I got older, though, I, um… well… a lot of stuff happened.” It was painful for Gina to revisit that part of her life. Even though she knew that there shouldn’t be any reason for her to feel guilty anymore, she couldn’t help it sometimes. The fact remained that while she may not have been directly responsible for what happened to Dakota, if she hadn’t impulsively kissed Nick like she did that day, none of this ever would have happened.

But that… wasn’t a part of her life she could touch without it hurting more than she could bear. She raised her head and saw the sympathy in Kim’s eyes, and let out a soft sigh of almost relief.

“…I started asking for other stuff, darker clothes, more wild outfits. Not, like, the kind of stuff I’m wearing these days, but definitely not anything my mom would ever buy for me herself, you know?” Gina sighed, scratching her cheek. “And she… didn’t like me wearing those clothes, so…”

Gina could recall so many fights she’d had with her mother over clothes. And when she’d dyed her hair against her mom’s wishes? Forget about it. She was certain that day that her mother was going to hit her, she was so mad! But of course, her mom wasn’t like that.

Maybe it would have been easier if she was…

“…I think I get it…” Kim said softly. The truth was, she could only kind of understand where Gina was coming from. All her life, she’d wanted to wear nice things, pretty clothes, hell- anything that didn’t come from a Good Will bin.

Her mother had explained over and over that money was tight and that they couldn’t afford to spend what little they had on new clothes.

It was reasonable.

Understandable.

But Kim still wanted those pretty dresses all the same. No matter how impractical it was, no matter how good she was at being the responsible, reasonable one who could save her money and not impulse buy something as worthless as a pretty dress…

She still wanted one.

“The reason you don’t want a pink dress is because of your mom, isn’t it?” Kim asked, looking Gina in the eyes. “She would always try to make you wear them instead of what you wanted to wear, so you started to hate them. Isn’t that right?”

Gina’s jaw dropped. She looked at Kim in shock.

“Dude, are you… you fucking psychic or something? Shit!” Gina scratched her head in confusion as everything started to make sense in her head now, after hearing Kim say that.

“It’s just… the vibe I’m getting,” Kim said with an awkward shrug. “I understand the feeling, you know? But this isn’t about your mom. Yeah, it was bad of her to try and control what you wore. So I understand it. But I mean… if you just refuse to wear anything pink ever again out of spite, then… isn’t she still controlling what you’re wearing, then? In a way?”

Gina stared at Kim, her mouth hanging open as she processed the tomboy’s words.

“…Like, maybe I’m wrong,” Kim said, suddenly feeling self-conscious about psychoanalyzing Gina like this, especially when “therapist” was NOT one of the many jobs on her long list of past careers. “I don’t know, okay? I’m just guessing, but… you should wear what you want to wear, Gina, because YOU want to, not because you’re trying to get back at your mother or something.”

“It’s not about that!” Gina protested, even though she was starting to think that maybe it was, at least a little. “I just… …Look, Kim, I don’t like pink anymore! I outgrew it a long time ago!”

Pink apron aside, anyway. But that was different.

Kim shrugged. “Look, Gina, I want to pick out a cute dress for you to wear, okay? And I think that pink would look lovely on you. I think Nick would really like it! But if you don’t want to wear one, if you don’t think it’s a good fit, then fine, we can forget about it! Whatever you want, okay?”

Kim had lost her privilege of input when she tried to manipulate Gina’s transformation. From this point on, the full saying really would be “The customer is always right” at least in regards to this specific interaction.

But she could see the hesitation on Gina’s face.

“Well… I mean…” Gina looked down at the stack of clothes, finding it hard to believe what she was about to say. “…You already picked ‘em out, so… it wouldn’t hurt to try them on, I guess?”

Kim’s eyes widened. “Really? You mean it?!” She was so proud of Gina if that was the case! Making a decision like this, and for herself, too!

“Well, it’s just… it’s easier that way!” Gina said, her face flushing. “You already grabbed ‘em, so I might as well! It’s not like I’ll choose one to wear or anything!”

She was already regretting this. Mostly. But part of her wasn’t.